Monday morning, (November 9) we took the subway to Honda Headquarters
at Aoyama Plaza. Just the same as last time, they had seven or eight
brand new, unlocked vehicles on display in front of the building in the
space between the building and the sidewalk. Nothing is missing from
these vehicles. The radios, knobs, and all small parts are all there.
And no security, either! Just try that in downtown Manhattan or Los
Angeles! Just an elderly gentleman, whose job it was all day long to
make sure that all dust, dirt, and fingerprints were removed from these
cars.

Upon entering the building, you are greeted by the "Honda Ladies", and
usually given some pamphlets or brochures. You can wander around for
hours, and not be hassled or made to feel like they want you to leave.
Quite the contrary, in fact, when everything they have makes you feel
like they want you to stay! I think a lot of western businesses could
learn a lot from our friends at Honda Motor Co., Ltd.

In addition to having almost every new model on display, they have an
oversized video screen with something interesting playing constantly, a
section devoted to motorcycles, a section devoted to power equipment, a
small cafe, and my favorite, the boutique.

I think that we all dropped some serious Yen here, grabbing all the
latest memorabilia, books, pins, posters, clothing, etc. A virtual
Honda lover's paradise! My largest (by size) purchase was an S car wall
hanging, that I just could not imagine carrying home with me on the
plane. The Honda Ladies very kindly protectively wrapped it for me, so
that I could take it to the local post office, and mail it home.

Speaking of post offices, I'm not sure what they are like in other
countries, but in Japan they had what I thought was a very nice system,
similar to what we have here in the U.S. at our deli counters. You take
a tag with a number, and seat yourself on a nice couch across from the
counter. There is a large, electronic screen showing the number being
served, so that, even if you don't speak the language, you still know
when it is your turn. Nothing Earth-shattering here, and certainly not
pertaining to Hondas, but a small attempt at giving you, dear reader,
some local flavor not relating to Hondas.

After coming back to headquarters from the post office, as previously
agreed upon, we all met outside. While I was at the post office, Jeff
was inquiring with the Honda Ladies about every Honda sales brochure
ever produced, and the others had struck out on their own to find some
lunch.

Food? Who needs it when you're in the land of Honda? Certainly not
me. Just ask Steve, or anyone who has been to an S Car Gathering. When
Hondas are around, food takes a back seat with me!
Next, we set out for Book Garage. This was a place that Koji had
suggested we visit the last time we were in Japan, and it was an
absolute must to return.

If you look up "hole in the wall" in the dictionary, there is a picture
of this place next to it. It is a tiny, little storefront no more than
10 feet wide and 20 feet deep located down a tiny, narrow alley, but oh,
what it has within those four walls! Tons of original manufacturer's
sales brochures, old car magazines, old car books, car post cards, car
posters, die cast models, plastic model kits; you name it, they've got
it!

When I came here in 1994, I think I made the young gentleman who waited
on me salesperson of the month, and quite possibly, the year! I spent
over $1,100 in this place last time! This time, I felt a little
dejected as I left having only purchased about $190 worth of goods.
Jeff's friend, Hideyuki Numajiri, who works for Mugen, had met us
there, and kindly gave us a ride back to the train station. He also set
up plans for meeting us tomorrow (Tuesday) at Twin Ring Motegi.
We went back to our hotel rooms, packed for the overnight stay at
Motegi, and took the train to Utsonomiya, where we then tried to figure
out the best way to actually get to the facility at nine o'clock in the
evening.

During the day, there are buses, but at that hour, it looked like our
only alternative was a taxi. We asked a waiting taxi driver for an
estimate on the price to take us there. He thought about it for a few
seconds, consulted with a colleague, and told us it would probably be
around 1,100 Yen. Well, that was an easy decision, especially since it
would be split three ways (2 taxis with 3 people in each).
Well, after about an hour and a half taxi ride over twisty, narrow,
hilly mountainous roads, we arrived at our destination with a mere
11,000 Yen showing on the meter. Clearly, something was lost in the
translation! Oh well, what are you going to do?! We were here at Twin
Ring Motegi, and that's what mattered.

We checked in, and went to our rooms. I was pretty tired at this
point, so I just went to bed. I think the rest of the group went out
exploring, with some of them ending up in the bar.

We arose the next morning (Tuesday, November 10) to look out the window
of our hotel room, and found it filled with a view of the entire race
track facility! Certainly, this wasn't a place to be for the faint of
heart where it comes to racing.
Steve, Jeff, and I decided to go out for our morning run. Jeff had
consulted earlier with the lady at the front desk as to a desirable
route for us to take. She had advised him of a perimeter route that
would take us around the entire complex, and be around 7 kilometers in
length.

We headed out from the hotel, down the road we had come up the night
before in the taxi. It was a very steep, twisty, downhill road with a
hairpin turn in it. Of course, we found out on our return run that what
goes down, must come up!

The road around the facility was breathtakingly beautiful as it gave us
great views of the entire facility from virtually all angles, with many
of them from altitude. This whole place really was carved out of the
mountains, and seeing it made me think about what an incredible amount
of work it must have taken. There was terracing everywhere, just to
give this place some flat land in which to build upon! (Later in the
day, we had asked Hideyuki if he knew how long it had taken to build the
facility. He wasn't certain, but thought that it was about four years.
Ken later told me that he had read something, somewhere that said it
cost Honda about $400,000,000!)

During the course of our run, we were able to get a good view of the
layout of the road course, the oval, pit lane and the grandstands, the
concessions, the Honda Fan Fun Lab, and from a distance, the Honda
Collection Hall.

After getting back to the room, and getting cleaned up, we got ready
for what was to be my favorite day of the whole trip. We took a small
shuttle bus from the hotel over to the Collection Hall.
It was incredible! The building itself was magnificent; three stories,
each with a North "Tower" and South "Tower" (wing), all connected by a
three story lobby with a grand, wooden staircase.

Immediately upon entering, you are greeted by large, round, glass
sculpture celebrating Mr. Honda's "Dream". Behind this, in the center
of the lobby, is a small , circular display, representative of all of
Honda's products from the past. This includes some power equipment, old
racing motorcycles, an N360, an RA272, and best of all, the Honda-owned,
white S500.

As you proceed through the lobby to the left (the South Tower) on the
first floor, you come upon the gift shop, a couple of small offices, a
"Document" room, and the Museum Cafe. To the right, in the North Tower,
is the "Special Display" room, which was hosting a very nice concept of
having similar products from the past and present displayed side by
side. This included power equipment old and new, old bikes next to
their modern equivalents, a first generation Civic next to a modern
Civic, a first year Accord next to a 1998 Accord, and so on. The best
display, of course, was a red S600 roadster displayed alongside a white
NSX-R!

Outside the building, behind the North Tower, is a smaller building
called the "Restoration Room". Here, through large windows, you can see
Honda associates at work restoring the vehicles for the Collection
Hall. They also have a small "Mini-course" beside the building for test
driving the finished products.

Parked in between the two buildings were a blue NSX, an orange,
Mugen-prepared City Turbo II racer, and a yellow S800 roadster. While
Jeff was salivating all over the City, one of the curators was kind
enough to open the bonnet and door of the S800 for me to videotape and
photograph it in greater detail. (He did the same for Jeff with the
City.) I was shocked to see that under the bonnet, there were;
incorrect bolts; corrosion around the master cylinders; incorrect hose
clamps; rust bubbling under the paint by where the chrome strip meets
the windshield; modern, red, braided fuel hose with a circa 1980 Civic
in-line, plastic filter; and an N/Z 600 fuel pump! The myth of factory
perfection had been shattered! Don't get me wrong; it was still a very
nice car, but certainly not restored to the level that I am used to
dealing with.

On the second floor in the South Tower, they have more racing
motorcycles than you can shake a stick at! Unfortunately, I'm not as
knowledgeable at old Honda race bikes as I am at old Honda cars. So to
avoid embarrassment, I won't try to go into much detail here, other than
to say that they did have the complete collection of all of the NRs.
That was a pretty impressive sight!

In the North Tower, they have all of their racing cars. Everything
that you can imagine from F3000, to F2, to F1 from the 60s to the 90s!
They also include some of the club racers, and spec class cars such as
Civics, Accords, and Cities. As much as I am in awe of the Formula 1
racers from the 60s, of course my true favorite was the beautifully
restored RSC racing S800.

This car won the GT-1 class at the 1968 Suzuka 12 Hour Automobile Race,
and finished 3rd overall, in spite of competing against cars with
engines as large as 3,000c.c.! Its engine displacement was increased to
872 c.c., which along with all of its other modifications, allowed it to
produce 100 horsepower at 10,500 r.p.m.!

Moving on to the third floor, the South Tower was filled to overflowing
with street motorcycles. I thought that they had a lot of race bikes!
Well, let me tell you that the size of that assortment pales in
comparison to the magnitude of the street machine collection! Here
again, I picked out a few favorites, but the magnitude of the collection
defies description, and after all, we're supposed to be talking about S
cars here anyway!

On the terrace that connects the South Tower to the North Tower on the
third floor, they have a large, sandwich-board style placard. This
contains a month-by-month, year-by-year history of their significant
milestones.

As you enter the North Tower, you are greeted by a wonderful display of
vintage Honda power equipment. They have many neat displays here,
including some of their earliest general-purpose engines.
Moving beyond this, you come to my favorite section, the passenger cars
and light trucks. Here, in my opinion, is the Honda Holy Grail! You
name it; it's there. S, T, L, P, N, TN, Z, Life, Vamos, 1300, 145,
Civics, Accords, Preludes, Quints, Integras, Vigors, Legends, Cities,
Todays, etc. in all generations!

Of particular interest to me were; the blue T360, with a separate
engine on an engine stand right next to the truck; a red S600 coupe,
parked alongside a red S800 roadster with a separate S600 engine on a
stand behind them; and last, but not least, the most forgotten about
members of the S family, the beautiful, blue L700 station wagon (What we
call a station wagon in the U.S., Honda called a "light van", and I know
that in some countries it is referred to as an "estate".), and a lovely,
green P800 pick up truck.

For anyone not familiar, these station wagons and trucks were produced
in the same time frame as the S series of cars. I find them all very
interesting, as I would hope that everyone involved with S cars would,
since they are the true siblings to our beloved little sports cars.
The T360 and T500 used slightly modified versions of the S engines,
some with the familiar 4 Kei Hin carburetor set up, others with a pair
of twin-throat Solex-Mikuni carbs.

The L700 and P700 used what was basically a modified, bored-out 600
engine with a pair of down-draft carbs sitting on top of a more
conventional manifold. The carbs look more like diaphragm style
side-drafts modified to sit on their ends than they do down-drafts.
The L800 and P800 used what was essentially a stock S800 engine, and
detuned it with a diaphragm style, single side-draft Kei Hin, mounted at
the back of a conventional looking manifold.The T series was produced from 1963 to 1967. The L series and P series
were both produced from 1965 to 1967.

After finishing all of my videotaping and photographing, I went
downstairs to the Gift Shop. I wandered around there for quite a while,
visually taking in all of the memorabilia. I purchased a few goodies,
but didn't go overboard.

I've got to say to those people who think it's difficult to find
memorabilia relating to our favorite, little sports cars, consider the
following: There, on some shelves on the left hand side of the Gift
Shop as you walk in, were some boxes boldly proclaiming in large, red
letters, "Honda S800 Cheese Cake." Yes, that's right folks; a Genuine
Honda S800 Cheese Cake, freshness dated for your protection! (No, I
didn't buy one. It never would have survived the trip home, although I
wish that I had gotten one of those boxes to add to my collection!)

When we left the Gift Shop, Hideyuki took Jeff and me over to the Honda
Fan Fun Lab. This is a building designed for some hands-on exhibits,
show casing present and future technologies. It has an amazing array of
exhibits including; clean-burning, zero level emissions gasoline
engines; cut-away outboard engines and motorcycles to see how all of the
internals actually work; a display exhibiting Honda's advanced and
patented efforts at recycling whole, used-up cars; an interactive
motorcycle riding simulator that both Jeff and I spent some time on;
solar powered cars; future power products; special vehicles for disabled
persons; electric vehicles that you could actually rent and drive around
the facility; a display of their ICVS (Intelligent Community Vehicle
System) future car network concept; new, not yet produced recreational
products; some racing vehicles and displays; a scaled down assembly line
to detail just how cars are assembled; displays of advanced heating and
air conditioning systems designed by Honda; a display of the P2 and P3
robots, designed and built by Honda; and, amazingly, all of this and
much more that I'm not even mentioning was all centered around the
experimental MH-02 Honda jet plane, and a large, circular theater,
appropriately called the Cylinder Theater (very similar to the Canadian
Circlevision theater at Epcot) that rotated, and moved up and down over
two floors, that showed an inspirational film about Honda associates all
over the world.

After Jeff and I had tortured Hideyuki by spending a couple of hours
there, the next stop on the tour was the paddock and pits along
the front straight. Hideyuki led us up some stairs that put us on top
of the pit buildings. As Jeff and I scanned our surroundings, and shot
some video, Hideyuki disappeared for a few minutes. Upon returning, he
had a smile on his face, and announced that he had some "very good news"
for us.

It turns out that while he was away, he had gone downstairs to speak
with some of the personnel. What he had done was ask one of their
professional race car drivers to take us for a few, quick laps around
the road course in a track-prepared NSX-R!

I can honestly say that it didn't take much time for us to say "yes" to
this offer! We practically ran down the stairs into the pit, where they
were supplying us with some helmets, and getting the car ready. Jeff
was so excited, he had to make a trip to the men's room, so I got to go
out first!
I walked around to the left (!) side, put on my helmet, got in, and
buckled up. As soon as I got my camera rolling, we were under way. The
yellow "R" sounded fantastic-very throaty and free-breathing. As the
driver chirped the tires heading down pit lane and out onto the course,
the smile on my face just kept growing!

The road course has a very interesting layout, which made it very
enjoyable, between the long straights, hairpins, other unique bends,
hills, and tunnels, which are a necessity with the way the facility is
arranged by incorporating the oval.

The first lap was thoroughly enjoyable, but slow by comparison with the
second and third, as the driver was bringing the tires up to
temperature. The second and third laps, however, were indescribably
delicious as the driver, who gave me total confidence in his abilities,
really slammed the car around the course. On the straights, we were
pegging the speedometer. He was using the curbs through the turns where
ever it was appropriate, and when it wasn't, we were right on the edge
between maximum lateral Gs and the tires just starting to break free! I
was having a hard time keeping the camera upright during the turns! The
car LITERALLY felt like it was on rails. Of course, he was using the
engine revs to their maximum potential throughout. I cannot possibly
describe to you the disappointment I felt when, at the conclusion of the
third lap, I felt him slowing down to pull into pit lane!

Upon exiting the car with many "domo arigatohs!", I found it almost
impossible to remove the helmet from my head as it kept getting stuck on
the grin on my face that stretched from ear to ear!
Next, it was Jeff's turn, which I filmed from just behind the pit lane
wall. According to Jeff, his ride was no less enjoyable than mine. As
they pulled into pit lane, it was getting dark, signaling the end of our
day at Twin Ring Motegi.

Hideyuki very graciously offered to drive us all the way back to Tokyo
as it saved us a train ride, it was close to his home, and it gave him
company for the long ride back. This was made possible because everyone
else in our contingent was unable to keep pace with me and Jeff at the
Collection Hall and the Honda Fan Fun Lab. So, they left earlier in the
afternoon to head back to Tokyo to do some shopping. Needless to say,
they missed out on our NSX adventure! Hmmm... Shopping or a drive
around the Motegi road course in an NSX-R... I wonder who had more fun??
When we arrived back at the hotel, Hideyuki presented me with a large
poster, and a promotional videotape of the S2000. Two very nice
mementos to go along with the brochure that I had picked up on it at
Honda headquarters. He also presented Jeff with an object of his
fantasies-a Mugen instrument cluster for Jeff's City Turbo II!
After another incredible day (and making the others jealous of our
NSX-R ride), we headed off to dreamland.